I've seen his film Huo zhe AKA To Live which follows a Chinese family and Chinese society from the 1940s to recent times. It's easy to forget just how underdeveloped the country was throughout much of 20th century.

The film was banned for its mild criticism of the Chinese gov't, so that aspect is interesting to watch. Other than that it's an effective drama with straightforward storytelling.

Given that Ghostbusters isn't allowed to screen in the country (Lucky them) because it "promotes cults and superstition" I'd say the government is cautious of any film that could potentially generate free thought or political unrest

Another answer to the last question with relation to >>7753 is that there is often an amount of pro-China propaganda one way or another in their films which, at least to me, are heavily negative aspects. It's similarly noticeable in Hollywood films trying to cash in on the Chinese audience. In Hollywood's case, at least, it's an easier way to convince the Chinese government to allow their film into their whitelist of allowed films.

Zhang Yimou was mentioned here. I personally enjoyed Hero (2002) for the most part until it hit heavily with the pro-China message.

Has gorgeous visuals, great action scenes, a cohesive theme, and it makes for a pretty tense thriller, I'd say it's his best work yet. Has anyone else here seen it yet? If not, here's a magnet (has both Chinese and English subtitles)

I'll have to say i don't remember this thread, I got stuck in the chink cinema for a year now, really cool stuff but they are very contrasting.

The Mainland Chinese industry is an actually underrated one because not a lot came out that wasn't outright propaganda because most talent ran away to Hong Kong. In my opinion China will not reach Hong Kong's level of success, because in terms of money i think even Jackie Chan and Jet Li made more bank with DVD/VHS sales than their brand of fantasy CGI fests with band members instead of actors. And in terms of artistic merit, i think HK had enough liberty and funds to let someone go nuts every once in a while.

Technically speaking Taiwan is the original Republic of China in exile after the gommies did their purges, as their political lineage is the direct one the monarchy/dinasty abdicated to (although the chinese invaded and replaced the original natives in a stone cold way here, you have been warned Canada)

But after all even with the Hong Kong takeover, it wasn't until 2004 or 2005 that Red China was producing movies constantly because earlier the works were Hong Kong products in terms of everything except the final papers that needed government seals and/or changing the ending. An exception would probably be >>10548 which had an egregious pro-China ending (not historical either) which even made Jet Li pull a political stunt to escape from the Bureau. Other than that the main cast was full of HK veterans and/or dissidents aside from Yimou.

Also >>8780 is full non-red china, and one of the few times a remaster beats the original by a mile.

I think Winter of Three Hairs looks interesting as an early example of Chinese cinema. But I wish I could find a better version of it. Every site seems to have the same rip, bad video quality but (strangely) surround sound audio.

Spring in a Small Town is another well-known Chinese film of the 1940s, the title seems to indicate a new beginning after WWII but I never checked if that's what the story is really about. I saw part if it last year. The subs gradually went out of sync so I stopped. I remember noticing the acting was unusually posed with characters making robotic movements and pauses.

Does anyone have a link for that martial arts thread on /tv/? It should be archived. A few months ago some guy posted brief descriptions of 50 or 100 of his favorites. People told him to post here instead to make it easier to find. Well now I need to find it.

Like i wanted to post because i always sperg out with that, the mainland gommie bureau did a damn chaos in the HK industry with their guidelines and corrective orders (i did like their input on Infernal Affairs) and many talents got away in terror around 1997 or simply didn't want to work in that atmosphere (plenty returned but got trapped)

HK did a lot of stuff, but mainly their medium to low-budget movies, especially the softcore and gore ones (the famous Category III films, or Blue Films) along with cheap comedy romances are what makes the good bulk of that pre-handover number. I mean it's kind of cheating to lump the softcore flicks and made for TV tearjerkers but i guess it counts, but at some points it gave great results: cannibal cop dramas with The Untold Story, gore fu with Riki-Oh, fetish sex fu with pic related and the deep horrors of 2 men kissing and checking their own oil with Happy Together.

I know pirated movies were overly rampant but at least there was a market for everything with the movie tax, but just like South Korea, when someone wants that foreign movie tax out, bad things happen in the local medium. And what's the best way to see how good you are doing than making porn movies with wire flying kung fu masters naked in a forest with a medium orchestra playing on the background. But even if they make 60 a year, it's rare that any of those push the limits like in the 90's.

It's /tv/ we are talking about here, half of them only post to cause controversy.

I remember that tripfag or some other chink mentioning in another thread that Tiger on the Beat had the best chainsaw scene in a movie, i haven't seen it but that director is top notch in terms of fights.

OP implied he had a top 100 made, shame he never went back to post it, at least the names only. We can always ask in the HK board, i think they have one (or was it Taiwan?)